


book zero: introduction

by camicazi



Series: the guardians of sijeun [1]
Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Urban Fantasy, Fae & Fairies, Immortals, M/M, Magical Realism, Minor Byun Baekhyun/Zhang Yi Xing | Lay, Minor Kim Junmyeon | Suho/Oh Sehun, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, a bit like a lyric essay i think, and that bit at the end, but also mentions of war, domestic chansoo, how are you bread reference
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-24
Updated: 2020-10-24
Packaged: 2021-03-08 20:02:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,631
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27162217
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/camicazi/pseuds/camicazi
Summary: They say there are only a few places as peculiar as the winding road of Sijeun Street—where the breeze is pulled into a constant battle between jasmine blossoms and cinnamon spice.Chanyeol has always been fond of the rumors.
Relationships: Do Kyungsoo | D.O/Park Chanyeol
Series: the guardians of sijeun [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1982638
Comments: 11
Kudos: 18





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> twitter: @mirasolexo

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> welcome to book zero.
> 
> ylang-ylang: also called kenanga, fragrant cananga, macassar-oil plant, or perfume tree

No matter which piece of gossip says it, no matter which ahjumma leans in, almost conspiratorial in her bent back and lined face, one thing always rings the same. 

They say there are only a few places as peculiar as the winding road of Sijeun Street.

The street is easily missed.

Nestled in the bustling metro of Busan, its concrete walkways are sandwiched between college footpaths and busy city establishments. 

Nearest to the intersection: a cafe that sells books besides coffee. 

The barista’s warm smile is a stamp that stays with most passersby until they see something brighter—like the sun peering through your lashes.

A little ways away is a bakery-slash-flower shop; the waiter always has to correct customers—only his partner can speak fluent English. 

The partner in question is famous for his How Are You bread, rumored to grant wishes.

The clean-cut baker, gone for a year, almost a faded memory to many of his regulars, usually doesn’t refute them, only bids them a happy day in perfect French.

Beside it is a nursery, filled with vines and succulents and earth, owned by a silent man with a warm voice.

He always seems to know what crops go best with what soils, and the grandmas have learned to go to his tall companion for discounts—he seems to be the only person that can get past his money-saving defenses.

A trinket shop here, a restaurant there.

Interesting, but not noteworthy. 

Not important. 

There are rumors around such a particular street.

Some are mild—

—the street is lucky, the street has a constant bright glare when you pass by the cafe beside the plant shop. 

Any coin you see lying around the antique parlor will bring you good luck, and any leaf that touches your leg during the autumn signals bad tidings ahead. 

Some are bizarre, met with a huff and disbelieving glance—

—the street is alive, the street is watching, the people that run its businesses aren’t real, aren’t _human._

No one really bothers to clarify.

Rumors can only go so far.

If mortals were being honest with themselves, it’s because they don’t know how to—don’t know how to give reason to the call of songbirds that remind them of days long gone, to the wild flowers of every color growing thickly along the plant boxes, inside gutters, creeping along window ledges. 

They settle with an explanation plucked out of the ancient scrolls, a suspension of disbelief, told through the restaurant waiter’s cheeky grin—

—the street knows something about yourself that you don’t, the street sees something that nothing else can. 

“But when the right ones are asked,” Kyungsoo almost always interrupts, like they’re performing a script, the ones that _know,_ they will tell you that its call feels like a soft pat on the shoulder.

You would do well to heed it, he tries to push, although from whatever he says next, it seems more warning than encouragement.

“The right ones will answer,” he shrugs, voice warm, “but it’s not like a prophecy or anything.”

He rings up the girl’s order, his gold-framed glasses catching the sun.

The morning rush of sleepy college kids provide most of their surface level earnings—the afternoons are lazy, used to experiment on dishes to be served at dinner, and the plant shop, co-owned by Yixing, is kept afloat by people that love the peculiar creations displayed in the front window. 

“You chalk it up to a weird draft, you’re tired and delirious because you need sleep, and maybe you pass by the same way, maybe it remembers you.”

The restaurant is part of the rumors—no one knows how long it’s been standing, and not even the kind man down at the trinket shop, the one that seems to know everything, will reveal how Kyungsoo gets the terrariums stationed outside to thrive in the height of winter.

Kyungsoo has always had an air around him; something that feels patient enough to watch flowers bloom and snails cross the road. 

“Sometimes the street is shy, you know?”

If the way he describes it isn’t enough, there’s a glint in his dark eyes that betrays a certain strangeness—a sparkle that mirrors the one around Chanyeol’s hands, reaching to give out steaming cups of coffee and pastries safely wrapped in bright to-go bags.

“But be careful about the whole ignoring situation,” Chanyeol leans over, “September to March is when the street gets grumpy, you see. It doesn’t give out second chances during those months.”

He talks about how autumn breezes and harsh winter flurries might be less insistent than their seasonal neighbors, lining up perfectly with the hearsays—

—the flower paths generally wait where they’ve been left (or ignored) for a few days, and the smell of brine and sunlight welcomes everyone that decides to come back to the street’s intersection.

“Thank you.” Kyungsoo hands over the change, smile turning into a heart. “Come again if you can.” 

Before the pretty girl in the red coat can ask him for his number—the street had always been visible to her, and she’d been wanting to try things with the cute owner for a while now—Chanyeol wraps an arm around Kyungsoo’s shoulders and presses a kiss to his forehead.

Kyungsoo stiffens at first, surprised, but then he melts, small sigh contented— _beautiful_ , like everything Kyungsoo is. 

Out of the corner of his eye, Chanyeol sees the girl leave. 

Red stains her cheeks, almost matching her coat, embarrassment quickening her gait.

“You’re too pretty for your own good,” Chanyeol mutters, breaking away.

He turns, partly to rearrange the paper cups that don’t need rearranging, and partly to hide the slight frown that won’t leave his face.

Autumn is a season dedicated to letting go—leaves falling, the air shedding its warmth. 

_bitter_ —

—oranges and reds and yellows, fires stoked amidst the loss of summer shine to make way for cold breezes;

 _sharp_ —

—you don’t see it until your plants begin to go back to where they came from, until you lose feeling as your fingers turn numb in light of your forgetfulness to put on your gloves this morning;

 _loud_ —

—because loss is one of the loudest things of all, and only those that have experienced it will learn to listen. 

Before he knows it, Kyungsoo’s arms come to wrap around his waist.

“‘M not prettier than you,” he mumbles into Chanyeol’s back.

His jasmine scent is intoxicating. 

It changed only this year; and Chanyeol is hard-pressed to admit that he hasn’t been keeping track of what Kyungsoo decided to wear along his skin. 

He’d stopped around the time Kyungsoo decided to smell like _ylang-ylang_ blossoms, probably before they moved to Seoul, sweet and subtle and comforting.

No matter what he wore, Chanyeol had thought, he’d always smell like home. 

“You’re cute when you’re jealous, Yeol.” 

“I’m not jealous,” Chanyeol replies. He turns to look at the spring fairy tracing circles into his side.

“Who says I’m jealous?”

Kyungsoo peers up at him, gaze all too knowing. 

Spring is a season dedicated to the phenomena of blooms—fresh shoots breaking through the soil, the sky turning a little bit pinker as it promises warmer days, action to come.

 _painful_ —

—because starting again, _starting over,_ always is;

 _silent_ —

—riots of color will always come from an abyss, the ground, absent of light, when you realize that hope can only come from the void of coldness, a winter of its own;

 _perceptive_ —

—it needs to know when to push, when to pull, its deceptively gentle hands knowing just how much they need to coax without breaking new stems and fueling sudden spurts of jealousy. 

“I love you,” Kyungsoo pouts. It takes Chanyeol’s breath away. “Won’t you say it back?”

A choked laugh is pulled from his throat, and he leans down so he can press his lips against his everything’s nose. 

“I love you too.”

His insecurity melts into a breeze.

Autumn is the season of letting go.

Kyungsoo’s mouth stretches into a smile.

Even after all the time he’s spent with him, each one is always more radiant than the last.

His lips are so perfect, and it might just be because he’s Kyungsoo, but Chanyeol always feels his heart break a little more.

It always surprises him that there is more to break. 

Something slams into the counter.

They jump apart, faces red, apologies for the customer ready—

“Good morning,” Baekhyun greets, hair flying every which way, “that was very disgusting. You guys can get me a waffle, right?”

This is as familiar as Kyungsoo’s smile—as old as time; Baekhyun, their long-time friend, long-time ally, and his tendency to interrupt them during intimate moments.

Kyungsoo’s laugh sends something molten weaving through the air.

He greets him a good morning back, landing a quick peck on the back of Chanyeol’s hand before heading over to the waffle machines. 

The restaurant is as well known for its strange breakfasts—claiming to make your day go smoother—just as much as its dinner specialties that claim to cure homesickness.

Chanyeol shakes his head, smiling, working to prepare their drinks. 

“How are the both of you so in love?” Baekhyun asks, sweater bunching around his elbows. 

The witch is in his signature blonde hair, long sun earrings dangling down to his neck. 

“It’s ridiculous. Everything about your relationship is unrealistic.”

“Most people think we aren’t real at all,” Chanyeol counters, placing heaping amounts of sugar into Kyungsoo’s black coffee. “So it checks out.”

Caramel goes into Baekhyun’s latte. 

He shaves cinnamon sticks into his spiced cider.

They’ve been called many other names throughout their lives—they were spirits, and then guardians, and then half-gods, and only recently, fairies.

 _Half-gods_ suited them more, but they didn’t give too much thought into what mortals called them. 

It didn’t matter. 

Their existence, to them, all boiled down to myth and legend.

If it didn’t, their societies accepted them, intertwined as deep as their cultures would allow.

“The both of you deserve it,” Baekhyun shrugs, although the pleased smile betrays his failed attempt at nonchalance. 

They settle on a booth beside the window, leather warm from sunbeams filtering through the floor-to-ceiling glass. 

Chanyeol watches the waves ebb and flow along the shore. 

The street’s chosen Busan this year. 

Last year it was Seoul.

Gyeongju, the year before that.

It doesn’t escape them that Junmyeon’s last sighting was by a stretch of sand, unmoving, water undeterred by the unconscious body laid out on its beach.

They would always follow.

They never had a choice.

“It isn’t like you to be sappy so early in the day.” Kyungsoo slides in beside him, and Chanyeol’s mouth puckers to ask for a kiss. “Did something happen?”

It quickly turns into a pout when Kyungsoo denies his request with a soft slap on the lips.

“Yixing came in last night,” Baekhyun mutters, a small sound. He’s jittery; knees bouncing under the table. 

“Something about sunset sky petunia strains?”

“We’d been working on that.” Kyungsoo cuts into his kimchi pancakes. “I think he got the combinations right this time. A touch of my spring dust and some of Jongdae’s laughter.”

That, and a shit-ton of magma-burned earth he’d had Chanyeol summon for the past few days. 

“It was in the middle of the night,” Baekhyun says, moving the strawberries and cream around his plate, and that’s when Chanyeol knows something is wrong.

“Just….crawled through my bedroom window.” 

“Doesn’t he always do that?” Chanyeol asks, sharing a look with Kyungsoo.

“He could have waited until morning.”

For all of Baekhyun’s noises of annoyance, this is one that’s catalogued into all of eight of their minds as _fake_. 

“It wasn’t important enough to disturb my beauty sleep.”

“But you got up anyway,” Chanyeol swirls his cinnamon stick, the caramel melting into the tea. “You let him in, didn’t you?” 

“He was hanging by the ledge,” Baekhyun defends, “what else could I have done?”

“Shooed him out,” Kyungsoo sips his coffee. “Closed your eyes and went back to sleep. The man can fly, Baekhyun.” 

Baekhyun is silent after that, almost sour in the way his eyebrows furrow and his eyes turn down. 

For a while, all there is is the pleasant understatement of wind chimes, the bacon in his mouth.

There have been many a mornings like this, just the three of them, like it always has been, even when the world was made of kingdoms and then metal giants and then quaint magical restaurants—they’d always find time to have breakfast together, just like how they met so long ago.

“I think I love him,” Baekhyun blurts, hopeless and wild and festering.

“He showed me the stupid plant in its pot and the flowers were pretty and he told me I’d have the first one of its kind if I kept it and would I have had a choice if I said no?” 

His words mix together in a flurry of discomposure so unlike the character he always liked to show. 

“He said that since I was a light witch I deserved to have my own small sun,” Baekhyun rambles on, “and he’d be flattered if I had a piece that reminded me of him.” 

Kyungsoo squeezes Chanyeol’s hand under the table.

While they enjoyed messing with nature, Yixing’s been fervent in getting the combination right, and Kyungsoo had only looked on as he kept waving for him to turn in early and to leave the shop for Yixing to close.

They had hypothesized about it in bed, in the silent moments of cooking during restaurant clean-up in the afternoons.

Yixing's efforts had taken on a new shine this year. 

“Yixing’s sweet like that,” Kyungsoo leans forward.

Chanyeol knows that gaze all too well—the one that pierced through all your inhibitions so you couldn’t lie to cover up your secrets.

Baekhyun does too. He shrinks.

“But he can’t wait forever. Can’t stay sweet forever. He’s been waiting for decades now.”

“Yes,” Baekhyun mumbles. “But—“

“But nothing,” Kyungsoo cuts him off.

His voice is gentle.

His eyes are patient.

Knowing.

“You’re not going to mess up. You’ve served your punishment. It’s over, Hyunnie. I promise.”

“You don’t know that.”

Baekhyun’s eyes have taken on a sheen.

“Nobody knows that. He could be—I don’t think I could survive it again if he’s another point that stupid god has to make Kyungsoo, I really don’t—“

“Come here.”

There have been many a mornings like this too, their breakfast laying forgotten in front of them, spiced cider smelling like the burden of their memories; long battles waged, sweet victories lost.

Baekhyun sniffles into Kyungsoo’s hoodie.

The sight isn’t new; isn’t wrong.

After all Baekhyun’s been through, Chanyeol knows he has the right to be cautious.

It’s impressive that he can stay smiling, stay their unwavering light, jokes always ready, impressions mastered and poised for laughter.

But the sight is unbearable.

It always triggers a wave of protectiveness Chanyeol can’t fix even if he tried—he would have to battle a god.

“You deserve to try again,” Kyungsoo whispers. “I’m tired of you doing this to yourself.”

Chanyeol rubs Baekhyun’s back, each shudder sending a pang through his chest.

Before it was the three of them, it was Kyungsoo and Baekhyun, both generals to a kingdom no more.

But it was in Chanyeol that Baekhyun relied on to be the _same_ , to know what he felt. To be a mirror.

Right now, there is something along his throat, squeezing, as if Baekhyun’s pain was his own.

It might as well be.

He understands. Too well.

He almost lost Kyungsoo the same way.

“Soo’s right,” he manages, “you can’t keep suffering, Hyunnie. You’ve done enough. The moon goddess gave you the jewel, didn’t she?”

“The last time I listened to that sorry excuse for an immortal,” Baekhyun says weakly, “I spent two years in exile.”

The both of them flinch, almost as if struck.

They recover quickly, but there’s little that can get through unnoticed when it comes to the three of them. 

“No,” Baekhyun amends, “no, I didn’t mean—you know what I’m trying to say—“

Kyungsoo shushes him. “We do. It’s okay. It’s all in the past now.”

Past has always been a peculiar word.

Mortals have likened it to a stream, and in those movies Kyungsoo makes them watch, a tunnel, all a straight line, but that might just be his everything’s penchant for science fiction.

They think it goes one way; perhaps a side-effect to its irrevocability, a homage to the way they cannot touch it once it passes by.

To them, the past set in stone, a linear point, A to B to C, even if, in the face of their history books and tales, they are so glaringly wrong to think that the past cannot be changed.

For Chanyeol and so many others, the closest thing they’ll have to a past are clouds: vast in their reach, a vault floating above their heads, sometimes blissfully clear, sometimes heavy, an overcast gray in its heaviness; almost infinite, but always, _always,_ they have to believe there is an end to their existence.

“How much longer, Hyunnie?” Chanyeol asks.

Baekhyun knows running best.

He folds everything in until there is no more of his wounds left to see, as if the blindness of others might extend to him, as if they can cover his eyes as much as he covered theirs. 

They say the past catches up to you—almost fluid in the way it finds so many things to wiggle into your present, so many cuts waiting for you in your future.

The past is a monster, slow and sure, clicking along your feet with its scissored hands and soft whispers of hope and love and humanity.

“I don’t know,” Baekhyun whispers.

His voice is defeated.

“I don’t even know if he deserves to be with me. If he deserves this mess, this walking disaster—“

“You talk like he hasn’t walked with you through your shit,” Kyungsoo assures.

Before anyone can get in another word, there is the sound of glass crashing, thin and sharp.

The weight of Chanyeol’s knife is home, just as much as Kyungsoo is.

A beat, and the buzz of Baekhyun’s powers radiate through the three of them. Kyungsoo’s sword is steady in his hand. 

Shards are strewn all over the floor—which was supposed to be impossible.

Their windchimes, enchanted as a failsafe against mortals that would be foolish enough to steal and trespass, have been tossed to the side, the string broken and the metal cracked.

The silence is interrupted by labored breathing.

“Get Yixing,” Kyungsoo commands.

Baekhyun takes off.

They rush to the creature’s side, blue blood leaking from somewhere under its clothes.

“A water spirit,” Chanyeol breathes. “But how could it have gotten this far?”

The beach might be visible from the restaurant windows, but it was much too small to be from the ocean.

This must have come from the river, especially with how its hair, black spilling across its shoulders, is covered in moss and tree branches.

Kyungsoo’s fingers trace down to its leg, almost human, but there—shimmering scales, gold and silver, gleaming where the light hits it.

There’s a rip along its thighs, and when Chanyeol’s eyes rove around its whole body, there are more along its arms, its waist.

It’s been chased.

The creature’s eyes meet his, shifting from pure white to brown and back.

It’s deceptively human (weren’t they all?), skin cold to the touch, the distinct marking on its collarbone flashing as she tries to speak.

Kyungsoo lifts her up, hand on her side.

It’s not the first time non-mortals seek help from them, but this is the first one since they’d moved from Seoul.

She mutters something unintelligible, but based on the way Kyungsoo stiffens, it’s another language of spring.

“What is it?” Chanyeol asks, because Kyungsoo’s hands have begun to shake. “What did she say?”

“Junmyeon,” Kyungsoo’s eyes are wide, disbelief scattered through his body. “He sent her—she’ll only talk to Minseok.”

More steps resonate through the space.

Chanyeol is shoved aside, but he can barely muster enough coherence to protest.

Yixing’s orders float through the restaurant.

Baekhyun shuffles along, then Jongdae lugging a medical bag, then Jongin.

Minseok comes last—his plaid shirt billowing in the wind.

Junmyeon.

A _year_ after they disappeared.

He doesn’t know what to make of it—doesn’t know what to do with the fact that the only sign they’d gotten that he was even alive was this dying river spirit that may or not have brought predators to their doors.

A hand comes to rest on top of his.

“Calm down, Yeol.”

Chanyeol blinks—the autumn wind dies out, taking the cold with it.

Kyungsoo’s hand is warm, grounding. 

It’s only when they’re spread out, the spirit wrapped in a blanket and attended to, Yixing wavering and sleepy, that Chanyeol lets go.

“Whatever you have to say,” Minseok starts, “you say it to all of us.”

“The man gave me specific instructions—“

“And we give you ours.” Minseok rarely ever had an edge to his voice, but now it’s hard, unyielding.

Whatever the reason for his insistence, Chanyeol senses a heaviness.

Maybe even a secret.

“Say your message and answer the questions, and we'll let you hide here a bit longer.”

The spirit huffs, ruffled but not deterred. “I have millennia on me, boy. Your little group has shaken our world to its core. I know your ways.”

There’s a collective breath as blades of ice materialize, pointing to her neck.

“Then you will know how unusual they are.”

“Hyung,” Kyungsoo warns.

The street is hallowed ground—it won’t take a liking to any violence, especially with non-mortals.

Their powers made for the most secure and heavily guarded portal in all the Three Realms, but within one intersection and the next, they were all bound by blood. And duty.

The ice blades inch closer.

“ _Now_.”

“You play with your limits too much.” Her eyes are pure white, so Chanyeol doesn’t know how she manages to make them full of contempt. “What will the Council say?”

“They’ll say a job well done for protecting an old bitch like you.”

No one dares to cross Minseok; not even Kyungsoo, when he gets like this.

And the funny thing is, not one of them knows why he’s so aggressive.

A secret indeed.

For a few moments, there is only silence, the cold winds tinkling through the shards on the floor.

Jongin’s coat rides past his knees, a crease between his handsome brows, and Jongdae fiddles with a new suncatcher.

“He wants you to find the key,” the spirit finally relents. “Something is eliminating those of kingdoms past—the ones in the west have been running for too long, and they have only been met with ignorance when they ask for help. They can’t move without the key. He wants you to stay vigilant.”

The news settles, bringing a different kind of heaviness on their shoulders.

Kyungsoo’s hand cards through his, offering home.

For too long they’ve been running, they’d only just had a place to be permanent—

“Stay vigilant of what?”

The spirit shakes her head. “He did not say. Only spent a night in my domain and bolted.”

A night.

Probably a blink compared to her years.

Minseok straightens, jumps off the table he was perched on. He seems to have gotten the answer he wanted.

“What was chasing you?”

“Ground demons.” The spirit’s lip curls in distaste to reveal a row of knifelike teeth. “A whole pack of them.”

“A pack?” Minseok’s forehead furrows. “They never attack in packs.”

“Times are changing.” The spirit stands on unsteady feet. “Do you not feel it? Unrest, even in my waters. You would do well to listen to your friend.”

Kyungsoo’s hand tightens in his.

They’d been doing more and more cleanups lately.

More and more trouble down the metropolis, more chaos, as if the monsters were being driven away by something.

Last month, he and Kyungsoo had gone down to solve a simple airhag being left astray—only to have the whole train station crawling with them when they arrived.

The spirit procures a pure ball of light, sending it up, up up; melting seamlessly into the street’s barriers.

Payment, tribute. 

Almost like a transaction. 

Before they know it, Jongin is back, dejection and worry across his features.

“The river,” he shakes his head, “it’s like something tore it up. I don’t know if it was them.”

 _Them_.

Junmyeon and Sehun.

“Minseok,” Yixing finally speaks.

Baekhyun jumps from where he’s perched above the healer, right on the arm of the couch.

Their conversation rushes back to Chanyeol, the reason he came to them in the first place.

Baekhyun moves like he’s been burned.

Outside, curious passersby peek through the ruined door, late college students and nosy ajuhmmas alike.

“I found poison on her leg. Drops of it, so they don’t have them at the claws.” He hesitates. “As far as I know, it’s native to China. The flower. It grows near along riverbanks. Something’s been shifting.”

“The field spirits have gotten restless too,” Jongdae adds. “They won’t keep still. Keep wanting me to enforce summer in the middle of February.”

Minseok sighs, slumping down on his seat.

“It sounds like something to eat over,” Kyungsoo drags Chanyeol up with him. The sun has lost its soft golds. The sky is brighter, blue and whites mocking in their lightness.

“Everyone tell Chanyeol how they want their coffee,” Kyungsoo shouts as he makes his way to the kitchen.

“The usual,” they all say.

Weeks go by.

Plans for search and rescue are given life.

A man stumbles into Sijeun street, limping and weak.

His coat is frayed at the edges, staggering towards a restaurant that feels like safety.

The street folds in on itself, a faint sheen shooting through the sky, flattening into a wall that shines for a split second before disappearing. 

Screeches echo into the stars, the smell of burning flesh, the whines of unholy creatures as they perish under the protective wards. 

The man will not die of pursuit.

Not tonight. 

One by one, the street opens its lights, rings its windchimes.

One by one, they wake up, seven hearts pounding in their chests, the haze of sleep being discarded as they make their way outside. 

Junmyeon doesn’t hear anything. 

He can barely see where he’s going—barely stand—let alone bother to knock. 

He doesn’t need to. 

Kyungsoo catches him in his arms, casting a look at everyone that comes running before heaving him inside, letting him down on the sofa. 

Junmyeon’s out before any of them can speak, but if the guardians on Sijeun street were being honest with themselves, they wouldn’t know what to say.

Their leader has returned—

But Sehun has not returned with him. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello friends <3
> 
> ah, this one is really short, think of it like a prologue!
> 
> the next chapter is a bonus chap: it's the same one you've read, but with chanyeol's annotations. 
> 
> it provides more of a glimpse into the au more than anything else (some of kyungsoo's secrets, like how he keeps the terrariums outside alive during winter), told through cheeky commentary. 
> 
> since the introduction is the only part of the series that will be meta, i thought to take it one step further. it's up to you though! 
> 
> the full end notes are on the next chap!


	2. (autumn copy)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> this shows the copy housed on the restaurant's shelves, with annotations made by autumn guardian Park Chanyeol.  
>   
> spring guardian Do Kyungsoo has implored him to sound professional, since it will be publicized, but as with his boyfriend's tendency to not listen, he only took it as a challenge.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (commentary is scribbled in parentheses.)

No matter which piece of gossip says it, no matter which ahjumma leans in, almost conspiratorial in her bent back and lined face, one thing always rings the same. 

They say there are only a few places as peculiar as the winding road of Sijeun Street.

The street is easily missed.

(Because it's selective. I saw it turn away a businessman once. He scratched his bald head for so long in front of Jongdae's shop like it just disappeared. It probably did.) 

Nestled in the bustling metro of Busan, its concrete walkways are sandwiched between college footpaths and busy city establishments, a quaint collection of shops littering its sides.

Nearest to the intersection : a cafe that sells books besides coffee.

(My books haven't been returned yet. I think Baekhyun uses them as paperweights. I want my Joseon-romances back.)

The barista’s warm smile is a stamp that stays with most passersby until they see something brighter—like the sun peering through your lashes.

A little ways away is a bakery-slash-flower shop.

The waiter always has to correct customers—only his partner can speak fluent English. 

The partner in question is famous for his How Are You bread, rumored to grant wishes.

(I said it was a marketing ploy once, and the parents were convinced. I think it was my truth-speak. Sorry, Junmyeon-hyung.)

The clean-cut baker, gone for a year, almost a faded memory to many of his regulars, usually doesn’t refute them and just bids a happy day in perfect French.

Beside it is a nursery, filled with vines and succulents and earth, owned by a silent man with a warm voice.

He always seems to know what crops go best with what soils, and the grandmas have learned to go to his tall companion for discounts—he seems to be the only person that can get past his money-saving defenses.

(Yeah. That and all of Kyungsoo's other defenses.)

A trinket shop here, a restaurant there.

Interesting, but not noteworthy.

Not important.

( _ ~~Excuse me?!~~_ )

There are rumors around Sijeun Street, collected through a haze between its trees that no one can ignore.

Some are mild—

—the street is lucky, the street has a constant glare when you pass by the cafe, like the light bouncing off ocean waves on particularly hot summer day. 

Any coin you see lying around the antique parlor will bring you good luck, and any leaf that touches your leg during the autumn signals bad tidings ahead.

(I don't know who made the autumn thing, but it reached me a couple years ago, and I thought, why not? Soo makes me tone the tricks down, but I have my fun.)

Some are bizarre, met with a huff and disbelieving glance—

—the street is alive, the street is watching, the people that run its businesses aren’t real, aren’t _human._

(Half-human is considered _a bit_ human, right?) 

No one really bothers to clarify.

Rumors can only go so far.

If mortals were being honest with themselves, it’s because they don’t know how to—don’t know how to give reason to the call of songbirds that remind them of times long gone, to the wild flowers of every color growing thickly along the plant boxes, inside gutters, creeping along window ledges.

(The songbirds were a gift from the west. Soo says Persia, but I say Cypriot. Jongdae will tell you that they came from our friends in Indonesia, when we helped them with their boar demons, but this is obviously untrue, because their gifts were the windchimes that protect our doors.)

They settle with an explanation plucked out of the ancient scrolls, a suspension of disbelief, told through the restaurant waiter’s cheeky grin—

—the street knows something about yourself that you don’t, the street sees something that nothing else can. 

“But when the right ones are asked,” Kyungsoo almost always interrupts, like they’re performing a script, the ones that _know,_ they will tell you that its call feels like a soft pat on the shoulder.

You would do well to heed it, he tries to push, although from whatever he says next, it seems more warning than encouragement.

“The right ones will answer,” he shrugs, voice warm, “but it’s not like a prophecy or anything.”

He rings up the girl’s order, his gold-framed glasses flashing.

The morning rush of sleepy college kids provide most of their surface level earnings—the afternoons are lazy, used to experiment on dishes to be served at dinner, and the plant shop, co-owned by Yixing, is kept afloat by people that love the bizarre creations displayed in the front window. 

“You chalk it up to a weird draft, you’re tired and delirious because you need sleep, and maybe you pass by the same way, maybe it remembers you.”

The restaurant is part of the rumors—no one knows how long it’s been standing, and not even the kind man down at the trinket shop, the one that seems to know everything, will reveal how Kyungsoo gets the terrariums stationed outside to thrive in the height of winter.

( ~~They're fake!~~ Minseok-hyung wraps them in frost, like that one Tinkerbell movie. Don't ask me how I know Tinkerbell movies.)

Kyungsoo has always had an air around him; something that feels patient enough to watch flowers bloom and snails cross the road.

(Don't believe that. He always makes me go pick them up to help them. One got trapped in a salt circle once, and I spent the rest of the day confused as to why Kyungsoo kept making kids trip along tree roots.)

“Sometimes the street is shy, you know?”

If the way he describes it isn’t enough, there’s a glint in his dark eyes that betrays a certain strangeness—a sparkle that mirrors the one around Chanyeol’s hands, reaching to give out steaming cups of coffee and pastries safely wrapped in bright to-go bags.

“But be careful about the whole ignoring situation,” Chanyeol leans over, “September to March is when the street gets grumpy, you see. It doesn’t give out second chances during those months.”

He talks about how autumn breezes and harsh winter flurries might be less insistent than their seasonal neighbors, lining up perfectly with the hearsays:

—the flower paths generally wait where they’ve been left (or ignored) for a few days, and the smell of brine and sunlight welcomes everyone that decides to come back to the street’s intersection.

(Soo has always been more forgiving than I am. If you ask me, Minseok and I know how to get our priorities straight. We'll be kinder to the ones that need it though.)

“Thank you.” Kyungsoo hands over the change, smile turning into a heart. “Come again if you can.” 

Before the pretty girl in the red coat can ask him for his number—the street had always been visible to her, and she’d been wanting to try things with the cute owner for a while now—Chanyeol wraps an arm around Kyungsoo’s shoulders and presses a kiss to his forehead.

Kyungsoo stiffens at first, surprised, but then he melts, small sigh contented— _beautiful_ , like everything Kyungsoo is.

(What sound does a whip make?)

Out of the corner of his eye, Chanyeol sees the girl leave. 

Red stains her cheeks, almost matching her coat, embarrassment quickening her gait.

“You’re too pretty for your own good,” Chanyeol mutters, breaking away.

He turns, partly to rearrange the paper cups that don’t need rearranging, and partly to hide the slight frown that won’t leave his face.

Autumn is a season dedicated to letting go—leaves falling, the air shedding its warmth. 

_bitter_ —

—oranges and reds and yellows, fires stoked amidst the loss of summer shine to make way for cold breezes;

 _sharp_ —

—you don’t see it until your plants begin to go back to where they came from, until you lose feeling as your fingers turn numb in light of your forgetfulness to put on your gloves this morning;

 _loud_ —

—because loss is one of the loudest things of all, and only those that have experienced it will learn to listen. 

Before he knows it, Kyungsoo’s arms come to wrap around his waist.

“‘M not prettier than you,” he mumbles into Chanyeol’s back.

His jasmine scent is intoxicating. 

It changed only this year; and Chanyeol is hard-pressed to admit that he hasn’t been keeping track of what Kyungsoo decided to wear along his skin. 

He’d stopped around the time Kyungsoo decided to smell like _ylang-ylang_ blossoms, probably before they moved to Seoul, sweet and subtle and comforting.

No matter he wore, Chanyeol had thought, he’d always smell like home. 

“You’re cute when you’re jealous, Yeol.” 

“I’m not jealous,” Chanyeol replies. He turns to look at the spring fairy tracing circles into his side.

“Who says I’m jealous?”

Kyungsoo peers up at him, gaze all too knowing. 

Spring is a season dedicated to the phenomena of blooms—fresh shoots breaking through the soil, the sky turning a little bit pinker as it promises warmer days, action to come.

 _painful_ —

—because starting again, _starting over,_ always is;

 _silent_ —

—riots of color will always come from an abyss, the ground, absent of light, when you realize that hope can only come from the void of coldness, a winter of its own;

 _perceptive_ —

—it needs to know when to push, when to pull, its deceptively gentle hands knowing just how much they need to coax without breaking new stems and fueling sudden spurts of jealousy. 

“I love you,” Kyungsoo pouts. It takes Chanyeol’s breath away. “Won’t you say it back?”

A choked laugh is pulled from his throat, and he leans down so he can press his lips against his everything’s nose. 

“I love you too.”

His insecurity melts into a breeze.

Autumn is the season of letting go.

Kyungsoo’s mouth stretches into a smile.

Even after all the time he’s spent with him, each one is always more radiant than the last.

His lips are so perfect, and it might just be because he’s Kyungsoo, but Chanyeol always feels his heart break a little more.

It always surprises him that there is more to break. 

Something slams into the counter.

They jump apart, faces red, apologies for the customer ready—

“Good morning,” Baekhyun greets, hair flying every which way, “that was very disgusting. You guys can get me a waffle, right?”

This is as familiar as Kyungsoo’s smile—as old as time; Baekhyun, their long-time friend, long-time ally, and his tendency to interrupt them during intimate moments.

(A curse, if you ask me. Decades with his annoying ass and you'd think he'd interrupt us a little less. One day he's going to walk in on something too intimate, and I just _know_ he's going to screech like a banshee.)

Kyungsoo’s laugh sends something molten weaving through the air.

He greets him a good morning back, landing a quick peck on the back of Chanyeol’s hand before heading over to the waffle machines. 

The restaurant is as well known for its strange breakfasts—claiming to make your day go smoother—just as much as its dinner specialties that claim to cure homesickness.

(Soo adds in special perilla leaves from his ~~secret~~ garden.)

Chanyeol shakes his head, smiling, working to prepare their drinks. 

“How are the both of you so in love?” Baekhyun asks, sweater bunching around his elbows. 

The witch is in his signature blonde hair, long sun earrings dangling down to his neck. 

“It’s ridiculous. Everything about your relationship is unrealistic.”

“Most people think we aren’t real at all,” Chanyeol counters, placing heaping amounts of sugar into Kyungsoo’s black coffee. “So it checks out.”

Caramel goes into Baekhyun’s latte. 

He shaves cinnamon sticks into his spiced cider.

They’ve been called many other names throughout their lives—they were spirits, and then guardians, and then half-gods, and only recently, fairies.

(I imagine our European friends, the _real_ fairies, won’t take to it too kindly, but western influence comes and goes. Johnny and Mark aren't too touchy when it comes to things like that.)

_Half-gods_ suited them more, but they didn’t give too much thought into what mortals called them. 

It didn’t matter. 

Their existence, to them, all boiled down to myth and legend.

If it didn’t, their societies accepted them, intertwined as deep as their cultures would allow.

“The both of you deserve it,” Baekhyun shrugs, although the pleased smile betrays his failed attempt at nonchalance. 

They settle on a booth beside the window, leather warm from sunbeams filtering through the floor-to-ceiling glass. 

Chanyeol watches the waves ebb and flow along the shore. 

The street’s chosen Busan this year. 

Last year it was Seoul.

Gyeongju, the year before that.

It doesn’t escape them that Junmyeon’s last sighting was by a stretch of sand, unmoving, water undeterred by the unconscious body laid out on its beach.

They would always follow.

They never had a choice.

“It isn’t like you to be sappy so early in the day.” Kyungsoo slides in beside him, and Chanyeol’s mouth puckers to ask for a kiss. “Did something happen?”

It quickly turns into a pout when Kyungsoo denies his request with a soft slap on the lips.

“Yixing came in last night,” Baekhyun mutters, a small sound. He’s jittery; knees bouncing under the table. 

“Something about sunset sky petunia strains?”

“We’d been working on that.” Kyungsoo cuts into his kimchi pancakes. “I think he got the combinations right this time. A touch of my spring dust and some of Jongdae’s laughter.”

That, and a shit-ton of magma-burned earth he’d had Chanyeol summon for the past few days.

(Which was totally unfair. Soo is my everything, but my back can only take so much lugging around.)

(Soo wants me to put in that I had gone to wars, which, honestly? No correlation. A broken back is a broken back.)

“It was in the middle of the night,” Baekhyun says, moving the strawberries and cream around his plate, and that’s when Chanyeol knows something is wrong.

(Baekhyun loves them. It's the one breakfast he's sticked with since waffles came to Korea.)

“Just….crawled through my bedroom window.” 

“Doesn’t he always do that?” Chanyeol asks, sharing a look with Kyungsoo.

“He could have waited until morning.”

For all of Baekhyun’s noises of annoyance, this is one that’s catalogued into all of eight of their minds as _fake_. 

“It wasn’t important enough to disturb my beauty sleep.”

“But you got up anyway,” Chanyeol swirls his cinnamon stick, the caramel melting into the tea. “You let him in, didn’t you?” 

“He was hanging by the ledge,” Baekhyun defends, “what else could I have done?”

“Shooed him out,” Kyungsoo sips his coffee. “Closed your eyes and went back to sleep. The man can fly, Baekhyun.” 

Baekhyun is silent after that, almost sour in the way his eyebrows furrow and his eyes turn down. 

For a while, all there is is the pleasant understatement of wind chimes, the bacon in his mouth.

There have been many a mornings like this, just the three of them, like it always has been, even when the world was made of kingdoms and then metal giants and then quaint magical restaurants—they’d always find time to have breakfast together, just like how they met so long ago.

“I think I love him,” Baekhyun blurts, hopeless and wild and festering.

“He showed me the stupid plant in its pot and the flowers were pretty and he told me I’d have the first one of its kind if I kept it and would I have had a choice if I said no?” 

His words mix together in a flurry of discomposure so unlike the character he always liked to show. 

“He said that since I was a light witch I deserved to have my own small sun,” Baekhyun rambles on, “and he’d be flattered if I had a piece that reminded me of him.” 

Kyungsoo squeezes Chanyeol’s hand under the table.

While they enjoyed messing with nature, Yixing’s been fervent in getting the combination right, and Kyungsoo had only looked on as he kept waving for him to turn in early and to leave the shop for Yixing to close.

They had hypothesized about it in bed, in the silent moments of cooking during restaurant clean-up in the afternoons.

Yixing's efforts had taken on a new shine this year. 

“Yixing’s sweet like that,” Kyungsoo leans forward.

Chanyeol knows that gaze all too well—the one that pierced through all your inhibitions so you couldn’t lie to cover up your secrets.

(It's not _scary_ , it's just...unnerving. Pretty, always, but unnerving.)

Baekhyun does too. He shrinks.

“But he can’t wait forever. Can’t stay sweet forever. He’s been waiting for decades now.”

“Yes,” Baekhyun mumbles. “But—“

“But nothing,” Kyungsoo cuts him off.

His voice is gentle.

His eyes are patient.

Knowing.

“You’re not going to mess up. You’ve served your punishment. It’s over, Hyunnie. I promise.”

“You don’t know that.”

Baekhyun’s eyes have taken on a sheen.

“Nobody knows that. He could be—I don’t think I could survive it again if he’s another point that stupid god has to make Kyungsoo, I really don’t—“

“Come here.”

There have been many a mornings like this too, their breakfast laying forgotten in front of them, spiced cider smelling like the burden of their memories; long battles waged, sweet victories lost.

Baekhyun sniffles into Kyungsoo’s hoodie.

The sight isn’t new; isn’t wrong.

After all Baekhyun’s been through, Chanyeol knows he has the right to be cautious.

It’s impressive that he can stay smiling, stay their unwavering light, jokes always ready, impressions mastered and poised for laughter.

But the sight is unbearable.

It always triggers a wave of protectiveness Chanyeol can’t fix even if he tried—he would have to battle a god.

(I'm not ready to leave the only family I've ever known just yet.)

“You deserve to try again,” Kyungsoo whispers. “I’m tired of you doing this to yourself.”

Chanyeol rubs Baekhyun’s back, each shudder sending a pang through his chest.

Before it was the three of them, it was Kyungsoo and Baekhyun, both generals to a kingdom no more.

But it was in Chanyeol that Baekhyun relied on to be the _same_ , to know what he felt. To be a mirror.

Right now, there is something along his throat, squeezing, as if Baekhyun’s pain was his own.

It might as well be.

He understands. Too well.

He almost lost Kyungsoo the same way.

( _Text has been crossed out, almost angrily, too much to properly make meaning of._ _Annotation illegible._ )

“Soo’s right,” he manages, “you can’t keep suffering, Hyunnie. You’ve done enough. The moon goddess gave you the jewel, didn’t she?”

“The last time I listened to that sorry excuse for an immortal,” Baekhyun says weakly, “I spent two years in exile.”

The both of them flinch, almost as if struck.

They recover quickly, but there’s little that can get through unnoticed when it comes to the three of them. 

“No,” Baekhyun amends, “no, I didn’t mean—you know what I’m trying to say—“

Kyungsoo shushes him. “We do. It’s okay. It’s all in the past now.”

Past has always been a peculiar word.

Mortals have likened it to a stream, and in those movies Kyungsoo makes them watch, a tunnel, all a straight line, but that might just be his everything’s penchant for science fiction.

They think it goes one way; perhaps a side-effect to its irrevocability, a homage to the way they cannot touch it once it passes by.

To them, the past set in stone, a linear point, A to B to C, even in the face of their history books and tales, they are so glaringly wrong to think that the past cannot be changed.

For Chanyeol and so many others, the closest thing they’ll have to a past are clouds: vast in their reach, a vault floating above their heads, sometimes blissfully clear, sometimes heavy, an overcast gray in its heaviness; almost infinite, but always, _always,_ they have to believe there is an end to their existence.

“How much longer, Hyunnie?” Chanyeol asks.

Baekhyun knows running best.

He folds everything in until there is no more of his wounds left to see, as if the blindness of others might extend to him, as if they can cover his eyes as much as he covered theirs. 

They say the past catches up to you—almost fluid in the way it finds so many things to wiggle into your present, so many cuts waiting for you in your future.

The past is a monster, slow and sure, clicking along your feet with its scissored hands and soft whispers of hope and love and humanity.

“I don’t know,” Baekhyun whispers.

His voice is defeated.

“I don’t even know if he deserves to be with me. If he deserves this mess, this walking disaster—“

“You talk like he hasn’t walked with you through your shit,” Kyungsoo assures.

Before anyone can get in another word, there is the sound of glass crashing, thin and sharp.

The weight of Chanyeol’s knife is home, just as much as Kyungsoo is.

A beat, and the buzz of Baekhyun’s powers radiate through the three of them. Kyungsoo’s sword is steady in his hand. 

Shards are strewn all over the floor—which was supposed to be impossible.

(Also inconvenient. The glass was sent in from Mongolia! It only opens for mortals with no bad intentions! I'm going to have to have it replaced with ordinary plexiglass, because I hate traveling along the silk road. My poor skin has had _enough_ of their suns. I'd wither into the crispy leaves autumn is known for.)

Their windchimes, enchanted as a failsafe against mortals that would be foolish enough to steal and trespass, have been tossed to the side, the string broken and the metal cracked.

The silence is interrupted by labored breathing.

“Get Yixing,” Kyungsoo commands.

Baekhyun takes off.

They rush to the creature’s side, blue blood leaking from somewhere under its clothes.

“A water spirit,” Chanyeol breathes. “But how could it have gotten this far?”

The beach might be visible from the restaurant windows, but it was much too small to be from the ocean.

This must have come from the river, especially with how its hair, black spilling across its shoulders, is covered in moss and tree branches.

Kyungsoo’s fingers trace down to its leg, almost human, but there—shimmering scales, gold and silver, gleaming where the light hits it. 

( ~~Like a koi fish.~~ )

(Soo won't let me say it because it's rude.)

There’s a rip along its thighs, and when Chanyeol’s eyes rove around its whole body, there are more along its arms, its waist.

It’s been chased.

The creature’s eyes meet his, shifting from pure white to brown and back.

It’s deceptively human (weren’t they all?), skin cold to the touch, the distinct marking on its collarbone flashing as she tries to speak.

Kyungsoo lifts her up, hand on her side.

It’s not the first time non-mortals seek help from them, but this is the first one since they’d moved from Seoul.

She mutters something unintelligible, but based on the way Kyungsoo stiffens, it’s another language of spring.

“What is it?” Chanyeol asks, because Kyungsoo’s hands have begun to shake. “What did she say?”

“Junmyeon,” Kyungsoo’s eyes are wide, disbelief scattered through his body. “He sent her—she’ll only talk to Minseok.”

More steps resonate through the space.

Chanyeol is shoved aside, but he can barely muster enough coherence to protest.

Yixing’s orders float through the restaurant.

Baekhyun shuffles along, then Jongdae lugging a medical bag, then Jongin.

Minseok comes last—his plaid shirt billowing in the wind.

Junmyeon.

A _year_ after they disappeared.

He doesn’t know what to make of it—doesn’t know what to do with the fact that the only sign they’d gotten that he was even alive was this dying river spirit that may or not have brought predators to their doors.

A hand comes to rest on top of his.

“Calm down, Yeol.”

Chanyeol blinks—the autumn wind dies out, taking the cold with it.

Kyungsoo’s hand is warm, grounding.

(I love him for that. I love him in general. There isn't a particular reason. I saw a chance to insert it on here and I took it.) 

It’s only when they’re spread out, the spirit wrapped in a blanket and attended to, Yixing wavering and sleepy, that Chanyeol lets go.

“Whatever you have to say,” Minseok starts, “you say it to all of us.”

“The man gave me specific instructions—“

“And we give you ours.” Minseok rarely ever had an edge to his voice, but now it’s hard, unyielding.

Whatever the reason for his insistence, Chanyeol senses a heaviness.

Maybe even a secret.

“Say your message and answer the questions, and we'll let you hide here a bit longer.”

The spirit huffs, ruffled but not deterred. “I have millennia on me, boy. Your little group has shaken our world to its core. I know your ways.”

There’s a collective breath as blades of ice materialize, pointing to her neck.

“Then you will know how unusual they are.”

“Hyung,” Kyungsoo warns.

The street is hallowed ground—it won’t take a liking to any violence, especially with non-mortals.

Their powers made for the most secure and heavily guarded portal in all the Three Realms, but within one intersection and the next, they were all bound by blood. And duty.

The ice blades inch closer.

“ _Now_.”

“You play with your limits too much.” Her eyes are pure white, so Chanyeol doesn’t know how she manages to make them full of contempt. “What will the Council say?”

“They’ll say a job well done for protecting an old bitch like you.”

No one dares to cross Minseok; not even Kyungsoo, when he gets like this.

And the funny thing is, not one of them knows why he’s so aggressive.

A secret indeed.

For a few moments, there is only silence, the cold winds tinkling through the shards on the floor.

Jongin’s coat rides past his knees, a crease between his handsome brows, and Jongdae fiddles with a new suncatcher.

“He wants you to find the key,” the spirit finally relents. “Something is eliminating those of kingdoms past—the ones in the west have been running for too long, and they have only been met with ignorance when they ask for help. They can’t move without the key. He wants you to stay vigilant.”

The news settles, bringing a different kind of heaviness on their shoulders.

Kyungsoo’s hand cards through his, offering home.

For too long they’ve been running, they’d only just had a place to be permanent—

“Stay vigilant of what?”

The spirit shakes her head. “He did not say. Only spent a night in my domain and bolted.”

A night.

Probably a blink compared to her years.

Minseok straightens, jumps off the table he was perched on. He seems to have gotten the answer he wanted.

“What was chasing you?”

“Ground demons.” The spirit’s lip curls in distaste to reveal a row of knifelike teeth. “A whole pack of them.”

“A pack?” Minseok’s forehead furrows. “They never attack in packs.”

“Times are changing.” The spirit stands on unsteady feet. “Do you not feel it? Unrest, even in my waters. You would do well to listen to your friend.”

Kyungsoo’s hand tightens in his.

They’d been doing more and more cleanups lately.

More and more trouble down the metropolis, more chaos, as if the monsters were being driven away by something.

Last month, he and Kyungsoo had gone down to solve a simple airhag being left astray—only to have the whole train station crawling with them when they arrived.

(Those little bitches. They had me and Kyungsoo in bandages for _weeks_. My poor baby had broken ribs. Every time I see one in the wild I toss it far from its nest.)

The spirit procures a pure ball of light, sending it up, up up; melting seamlessly into the street’s barriers.

Payment, tribute. 

Almost like a transaction.

(We need it to keep ~~Jongin's shopaholic tendencies~~ the street running.)

Before they know it, Jongin is back, dejection and worry across his features.

“The river,” he shakes his head, “it’s like something tore it up. I don’t know if it was them.”

 _Them_.

Junmyeon and Sehun.

“Minseok,” Yixing finally speaks.

Baekhyun jumps from where he’s perched above the healer, right on the arm of the couch.

Their conversation rushes back to Chanyeol, the reason he came to them in the first place.

Baekhyun moves like he’s been burned.

Outside, curious passersby peek through the ruined door, late college students and nosy ajuhmmas alike.

“I found poison on her leg. Drops of it, so they don’t have them at the claws.” He hesitates. “As far as I know, it’s native to China. The flower. It grows near along riverbanks. Something’s been shifting.”

“The field spirits have gotten restless too,” Jongdae adds. “They won’t keep still. Keep wanting me to enforce summer in the middle of February.”

Minseok sighs, slumping down on his seat.

“It sounds like something to eat over,” Kyungsoo drags Chanyeol up with him. The sun has lost its soft golds. The sky is brighter, blue and whites mocking in their lightness.

“Everyone tell Chanyeol how they want their coffee,” Kyungsoo shouts as he makes his way to the kitchen.

“The usual,” they all say.

(I'd tell you what all of them were, but Soo says not to scribble on our copy of the books too much.)

( _You've said enough, Yeol._ )

Weeks go by.

Plans for search and rescue are given life.

A man stumbles into Sijeun street, limping and weak.

His coat is frayed at the edges, staggering towards a restaurant that feels like safety.

The street folds in on itself, a faint sheen shooting through the sky, flattening into a wall that shines for a split second before disappearing. 

Screeches echo into the night, the smell of burning flesh, the whines of unholy creatures as they perish under the protective wards. 

The man will not die of pursuit.

Not tonight. 

One by one, the street opens its lights, rings its windchimes.

One by one, they wake up, seven hearts pounding in their chests, the haze of sleep being discarded as they make their way outside. 

Junmyeon doesn’t hear anything. 

He can barely see where he’s going—barely stand—let alone bother to knock. 

He doesn’t need to. 

Kyungsoo catches him in his arms, casting a look at everyone that comes running before heaving him inside, letting him down on the sofa. 

Junmyeon’s out before any of them can speak, but if the guardians on Sijeun street were being honest with themselves, they wouldn’t know what to say.

Their leader has returned—

But Sehun has not returned with him. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello, thank you for reading till the end!
> 
> to be honest, i've been a bit hesitant to show a genre like this, even if it's what i've been itching to do since i started writing (fantasy). 
> 
> (this au was inspired by chanyeol's dispatch/nacific update.) 
> 
> this particular piece even had a bit of reliance on language, meaning it didn't flow on continuity, and i thought, since it's a sneak peek to the series, it’ll be more character sketches together with a little worldbuilding. 
> 
> my twitter is @mirasolexo, and i post reference pictures to some of the items mentioned here, (and I ramble on about the world they have in the thread too!), so if you want to, check those out :>
> 
> if you liked it, please consider leaving kudos/comments, i'd love to know what you think <3


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